Uh, wow.

Really. Wow.

I don't know how author Dan Brown did it, but somehow he managed to successfully combine an intriguing murder-mystery/suspense/thriller with a textbook on religious symbology and Western religious history. He has outdone himself.

At the beginning of the story, the head curator of the Louvre is attacked and fatally wounded in his own museum. But the man is more than just a curator; he is the last surviving member of a secret society that protects a shocking secret, a clandestine organization whose former members include Sir Isaac Newton, Victor Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci, and if he dies, the knowledge he protects will be lost forever. Before he dies, however, he manages to use his final moments to leave a message to his estranged granddaughter, Sophie Nevue, a police cryptographer. Soon she and Robert Langdon, Professor of Religious Symbology at Harvard, find themselves on the run from the police and a shadowy operative who seems to anticipate their every move. Before long, the simple murder investigation turns into a quest to discover a secret that has been hidden since the days of Christ: the Holy Grail itself.

But the Grail is something more than what we have been told in Indiana Jones and Monty Python movies. It holds a secret which threatens to destroy the very foundation of the Christian Church, and a secret Catholic organization will stop at nothing to destroy the truth.

Painstakingly thought-out and exhaustively researched, The Da Vinci Code is a masterpiece of realistic fiction. Every description of artwork, secret rituals, and historical event is factually accurate. Brown explores aspects of Christianity and history that I hadn't even known existed. Though some people may disagree with his interpretation of historical events, particularly his conjectures surrounding the nature of Jesus Christ, no one can argue that his research is anything but flawless.

I've read a crapload of books, and a lot of them have been really good. But this one may be the best of the lot. The story is incredible; it is packed with twists and turns and is utterly unpredictable to the very end. If there is perhaps one minor flaw it's that the main characters are maybe a bit too superhero-ish in their immense piles of knowledge, but that's just a minor nitpick, and well, meh. I was too busy reading to notice or care.

Wow.

Rating: 5/5 Stars